


Wish

by Baylor



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Djinni & Genies, Gen, Kid Fic, Pre-Series
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-08-18
Updated: 2013-08-18
Packaged: 2017-12-23 22:44:26
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,776
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/931952
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Baylor/pseuds/Baylor
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>What would you wish for?</p>
            </blockquote>





	Wish

**Author's Note:**

> Pre-series.
> 
> Podfic available [here](http://archiveofourown.org/works/941762).

January 1991

Rolled up, Sammy thinks that the rug looks like a giant Fruit Roll-Up, ready to be smoothed flat and peeled apart and used to taunt Dean because it's the last one. He wants to know what it looks like all unrolled, so he plants his feet into its fringe and starts pushing. It's heavy, so he uses his shoulder and throws his weight into it, like Dad says.

"There's nothing in there, Sammy," Dean says. "Come on and help us look."

"It's heavy," Sammy says, his voice tight with the effort.

"'Cause you're a wimp," Dean says and smirks at Sammy. Sammy would like to stick out his tongue or think up a good response but unrolling the heavy rug -- now revealing itself in dark red and gold and deep blue pattern -- is taking all his concentration. Dean sighs and goes back to picking through antiques. Searching for a cursed object is time-consuming and tedious, Dad says, but it's got to be done.

Sammy has to stop briefly to push a chair out of the way and Dad yells, "Sammy, what are you doing over there?"

"He's unrolling some stupid rug," Dean answers and Sammy glares at him. 

"There's something in it, Dad," Sammy asserts, because now he can see where the rug is lumpy from being wrapped around something. Suddenly Dad is behind him, and just as he says sharply, "Sammy, step away from that," Sammy gives the rug a final shove and it flops open to reveal a lady all dressed in black.

* * * 

Dad says her name is Genie, and at first Sammy thinks he means J-E-A-N-N-I-E, like a girl who baby-sat him and Dean a few times when they were very small and living in South Dakota, but then he realizes that Dad means G-E-N-I-E, like the ones that live in magic lamps, only this one lives in a rug.

"So I get three wishes?" Sammy asks as soon as he realizes what Dad meant, too excited to keep himself from interrupting Dad, who is talking sternly to Genie. 

"You unrolled me," Genie answers. She is leaning casually against a sideboard in the warehouse, seemingly unintimidated by John Winchester. 

"No one's making any wishes, Sammy," Dad says firmly. 

"It doesn't really have anything to do with you," Genie says in a bored voice. "He unrolled me. Those are the rules." 

"He's a little boy," Dad says to Genie, who shrugs.

"Trust me, I didn't make the rules," she tells Dad. 

* * * 

They don't have to look for the cursed object anymore, because apparently Genie herself was the cursed object, or at least the thing causing all the trouble Dad was trying to put right.

"That's the thing about genies," Dad tells Sammy, leaning over to look him in the face as they stand beside the Impala. "They're more of a curse than anything else. They'll twist your wishes around to turn them against you, and horrible things can happen. That's why you couldn't use the wishes, Sammy."

This was after Dad had insisted Genie lie down so he could roll her back up. She had rolled her eyes at him but complied. She was in the trunk of the Impala now, secure in her rug. 

Sammy is disappointed. He'd never been able to wish for anything that could be real before. Back in the Impala, he leans his face against the cool window and wonders what he could have wished for.

"Like I said, it really doesn't work that way," Genie says, because she is suddenly in the back seat with Sammy, watching the scenery go by with a bored expression. "Rolling me back up won't change the fact that I owe your son three wishes."

Sammy can see Dad's jaw clenching, and his knuckles are white on the steering wheel, but he doesn't turn around to answer Genie. Dean twists around in the passenger seat to gawk until Dad cuffs him in the head. 

"And you won't get rid of me until he's made them," Genie adds. Dad clenches his jaw tighter and keeps driving.

* * * 

Genie says that she is more than 600 years old. She doesn't know how many people she's granted wishes for, but she claims some of them are famous, even though Dean and Sammy don't recognize their names. Sammy thinks Dad knows some of them, though, because of the way his eyes flicker to the rearview mirror when she names them. 

She says that she doesn't need to eat or drink, although sometimes she does when she's not in the rug, just for something to do. She doesn't sleep either, although she says that she "rests" in the rug, and that time is different when she's in there. She just shrugs when Sammy asks her how she got from the rug into the back seat. 

She became a genie, she says in response to Sam's question, when she unrolled a rug with a genie in it and asked for long life and great power.

"So he made you a genie too," Sammy says, and Genie smiles at him.

"You're a smart kid," she says.

"What's the weirdest thing anyone has ever wished for?" Dean demands, twisting around in the front seat again. 

"Hmm." Genie taps her chin with her forefinger as she thinks. "There was a man who wanted his dog to be able to talk."

"Really?" Dean asks, impressed. "What did the dog say?"

"Told him that his wife was cheating with the neighbor," Genie answers dryly, and Dean starts laughing.

"Can you do anything, if someone wishes it?" Sammy asks.

"Just about," Genie says.

"Can you bring people back to life?" Sammy asks, and suddenly the Impala is very quiet, only the sound of Dad and Dean breathing loud and raspy in the front.

"Sammy, no," Dad says, but Genie interrupts him. 

"No," she says. "I can make their bodies come back to life, but it's not really them. It's not very nice."

"Oh," Sammy says, and thinks hard. "Is there anything else that you can't do? Anything I can't wish for?"

"You can't wish for anything, period," Dad says, but Genie is still ignoring him. 

"I can't kill anyone," she says. "And I can't change the nature of people. Like, I could make all war and hate and killing end, but I'd have to do it by making everyone on earth disappear."

Sammy nods; that makes sense.

"And no wishing for more wishes," Genie adds. 

"Right," Sammy says, then, "Dad says you're more of a curse than anything else."

Genie shrugs. "People get what they deserve," she answers. "Once, there was a boy about your brother's age who unrolled me. First, he asked me to make his big sister into a toad. Then, he wanted me to make it so his school master couldn't speak anymore. And finally, he asked me to make him big and strong so he could terrify his playmates."

"What happened to him?" Dean asks.

"I turned him into a bear," Genie says. "The last I saw him, he was running off into the woods and his father was chasing after him with a gun."

"Wow," Dean says, but Sammy is upset. 

"That wasn't nice," he tells Genie, but she doesn't care about his distress.

"Neither was him wanting his sister turned into a toad," Genie says. "People get what they deserve."

* * * 

That night, in the motel, when Dean is asleep and Sammy is supposed to be but is only halfway there, Dad talks to Genie for a long time about how Sammy cannot use his wishes. 

"Sammy is just a kid, and he's a good kid. A sweet kid," Dad says, and Sammy is happy that Dad thinks he's a good kid.

"He is a sweet kid," Genie says. "He's not going to ask me to turn the other one into a toad. Stop worrying."

"Genies trick people," Dad says, and Genie interrupts him.

"No tricks," she says, and the room is quiet for several minutes.

"You could unroll me yourself after Sammy makes his wishes," Genie says suddenly. "All the things you're afraid of -- I could make them go away, and you'd never have to know them," and Sammy feels the light weight of her fingers on his hair. 

Dad makes a strangled noise and says, "Get out of here," and her fingers are gone from Sammy's hair, just like that.

* * * 

She's in the back seat of the Impala again the next day, and Sammy thinks that he should warn her that Dad made a bunch of phone calls that morning about how to get rid of a genie, but Dad never leaves him alone with her, and he thinks she probably knows already anyway.

"What would you wish for, Dean, if you had a genie?" he asks suddenly. 

Dean squirms around in the seat. "I dunno. I think maybe a cool superhero power, like to fly like Superman, or to shoot lasers from my eyes like Cyclops."

Sammy nods solemnly. Those were excellent wishes.

"What would you wish for, Dad?" he asks, and then wishes he hadn't, because now there's going to be another speech about genies and curses.

Instead, Dad just says, "Ammo," and Sammy and Dean both burst out laughing.

"That's so lame, Dad," Dean says.

"You can buy ammo, Dad," Sammy giggles, and Dad answers seriously, "Not without money." Then he sighs and says, "OK, how about a shotgun that never runs out of ammo? A magically always-loaded shotgun."

"That's a really good one," Sammy says, and Dean looks impressed. Sammy looks at Genie to see what she thinks, and she's smiling.

"Not bad," she says.

* * * 

When Sammy is alone in the bathroom brushing his teeth, Genie is suddenly there with him, sitting on the closed toilet.

"You didn't say what you would wish for, Sammy," she says.

Sammy spits toothpaste out of his mouth. "I don't think that I should say," he answers. "Not until I'm sure."

Genie nods in understanding. "What kind of things do you want, then?" she said. "Not for your wishes."

Sammy rinses off his toothbrush carefully and doesn't look at her. When he finally sets the toothbrush down, he turns to Genie, but feels too shy suddenly to look up from the floor. 

"All I really want is a home for me and Dean and Dad," he tells her. "But if I wished for a home and you gave it to us, Dad would just end up selling it."

"Hmm," Genie says thoughtfully. "Probably for ammo money."

"Yeah," Sammy whispers, and it should be funny, like Dad's wish for a magical always-loaded shotgun, but it's not funny, not really.

"Anything else?" Genie asks, and they're close enough that she can nudge him with her knee. Sammy looks up and her face is just thoughtful, not pitying or mocking or anything not nice to see. He nods and leans in conspiratorially.

"A puppy," he whispers, and he smiles just at the thought of it, a wiggling, happy puppy that would lick his face and come running gleefully to him when he called its name and sleep right in between him and Dean every night.

"That's a good one," Genie whispers back.

* * * 

Dad calls Pastor Jim and Caleb and Bobby and lots of other people, but no one knows anything about how to get rid of a genie. Sammy doesn't think they're going to get rid of her until he makes his wishes, no matter what Dad says. 

Sammy thinks that maybe it isn't that Genie is a curse, but that people ask for bad things, or foolish things, or things that they just shouldn't have. He thinks that maybe Genie is right, and people just get what they deserve for being silly or mean or greedy.

Sammy doesn't think he's silly or mean or greedy. 

* * * 

January 24 is Dean's birthday, and it's a Thursday and they're in Alabama but Dad wants to be in Idaho by Monday because Jefferson thinks there's a necromancer up there but he can't finish the job himself and Dad can have the apartment for now and there's a school for the boys. This all means that Dad drove up from Florida until late at night and he wants to get going again early so neither Dad nor Dean remembers about the birthday until they turn on the lights and see the big sheet cake on the little table and the wrapped present sitting on the dresser.

"Happy birthday, Dean!" Sammy yells, and jumps on the bed. Dean's eyes are huge. The cake is the great big kind that you see in the store, and it says, "Happy Birthday, Dean!" in frosting. Two big candles, a "1" and a "2" also adorn it, and as Dean takes it in, they light themselves.

Sammy grabs Dean's present off the dresser and shoves it at him. "Blow out your candles!" he orders. "Open your present!" Dean takes the present and slowly looks it over, then looks at Dad.

"Sammy," Dad says slowly, "is this what you wished for?" and Sammy's stomach drops, because he doesn't want to ruin Dean's birthday by being in trouble.

"Yes, sir," he answers, and reaches out to hold onto Dean even though he knows that's a babyish thing to do. "Don't be mad, Dad. It's not a trick, it's not cursed."

"What, exactly," Dad's voice is carefully measured, which could be good or bad, "did you wish for?"

"A birthday cake for Dean," Genie answers, because she's suddenly in the chair. "The fancy kind, like you buy in the store. Chocolate with lots of frosting."

Sammy isn't sure, but he thinks that Dad might be smiling. 

"And this?" he asks, gesturing at the present in Dean's hands.

It turns out to be a new baseball mitt, because Dean lost his that fall in Ohio, and it's a really nice one that Sammy never could have saved up to buy himself, and it makes Dean's whole face light up. Dad finally lets him blow out the candles and they all have cake for breakfast.

"Did Sammy specify these?" Dad asks, and pulls one of the sugar decorations off the cake. 

"I took some creative license," Genie says, and winks at Sammy, who laughs and pulls another Ghostbuster sugar-figure off the cake.

* * * 

Sammy is putting bags in the back seat when Genie is suddenly there, leaning against the trunk of the Impala.

"I think Dean had a good birthday," Sammy tells her happily. Dean and Dad are inside, debating how to load the leftover cake into the car.

"I think so too," Genie says, and leans over to look him in the face. "So, what'll it be, Sammy? Ready to use that last wish? You could get your dad that always-loaded shotgun. Or I could make you fly -- and I promise not to turn you into a bird. Or," she leans closer and drops her voice, "how about that puppy?"

Sammy thinks about a puppy, squirmy and warm and all wagging tail. "What would you wish for?" he asks Genie suddenly, and she shakes her head.

"It's your wish," she says.

"But what if it were yours," Sammy demands, and he reaches out to take her hand. "Isn't there anything that you want, Genie?"

* * * 

Dad finally just sets the leftover cake carefully in the back seat next to Sammy and admonishes the boys not to get any on the upholstery, but it's kind of hard, since they're eating it with their hands and Sammy is laughing at how it's all over Dean's face and Dean says that Sammy looks like he took a cake bath that morning. 

"You know, you don't have to eat the whole thing today," Dad says.

Dean licks his fingers. "It's in Genie's seat," he says. "Just trying to make room." He twists around to look at Sammy. "Where is Genie, anyway?"

Sammy is eating a row of frosting along the edge of his piece and he grins at Dean, then opens his mouth to show Dean the half-eaten cake inside his mouth. Dean cracks up and yells, "Sammy, gross!" before turning back around. Sammy looks at Dad, and he's smiling.

"I'm sure she's around," Dad says. "You didn't make a third wish, did you, Sammy?"

Sammy leans forward to reach as far around the seat as he can, wanting to smear his chocolate-covered hands on Dean's face, but he can only reach his brother's ears so he settles for them.

"Sammy," Dad says above Dean's squawks, "you made your third wish? What was it for?"

Sammy just happily sticks his fingers in Dean's ears and smiles at his dad.

**Author's Note:**

> I have completely ripped off the plot of _The X-Files_ episode "Je Souhaite," but this story and that episode don't necessarily exist in the same universe.


End file.
